I would like to mod my first game sometime in December or January, but I was just wondering, what computer programs do some of you use when you're creating and modding a game? I've seen mention of posters saying that they use computer programs to keep track of the games, but never exactly what programs they are. Is it mostly Excel and Word? Or do some of you use mafia-specific programs?

spreadsheets are sometimes good for keeping track of actions, it helped a ton in my second rolegift game, and a word type program is pretty much essential to keep track of role PMs. (I suppose you could just make another folder in your PM box to save them in if you aren't using any special hidden mechanics though)

I have often heard him say that he would not begin life again if he had to pay for it by his years at school. There is, he is accustomed to say, only one crime which is beyond pardon, the crime which poisons the pleasures and kills the smile of a child

I also just use Text Edit as well........ Theres really not that much to track at all, programs may just make things more confusing haha. Maybe if you were hosting a 20+ player game with no vanilla you may need to write a spreadsheet or something.... But a running list works for me..

Use Microsoft Word for pm's (Let's face it, you can't really use a better program for things you write up like that).

Microsoft "Spreadsheet" (Basically Excel just on Vista) to keep track of actions and the dead/living with the text and background colour coding it uses.(Just to maybe give you an idea of this I basically use these colours)~Black across the board from the spot they die to the end game (where ever it ends at).~Red background if the action is blocked or they died so the information is useless.~Green background for actions that went through~Blue background for special actions that get information.Then from there I use coloured text to keep track of whom is in which faction/side. (for the Halo game I did I had 4 different factions to keep track of, so the colours of the text helped).

Also, just because I am me. I use a deck of cards (take out however many are playing and assign a player a card and draw them out for each different role at random, but that's just me and my weirdness).

Finally something people don't seem to have said, so it may be just me. But I keep track of warnings, and restrictions to players another Word file. If they continue doing something that is against their restrictions or warnings then I've been known to mod kill with very little patience. Also document misc things and notes for after the game if I need to say anything.

I keep vote tallies on an actual piece of paper. Easier to scratch out something without having to change tabs or screens. I used to do them in a reply-to-topic-tab, but that turned out to have a much larger error margin.

aage wrote:I keep vote tallies on an actual piece of paper. Easier to scratch out something without having to change tabs or screens. I used to do them in a reply-to-topic-tab, but that turned out to have a much larger error margin.

aage wrote:I keep vote tallies on an actual piece of paper. Easier to scratch out something without having to change tabs or screens. I used to do them in a reply-to-topic-tab, but that turned out to have a much larger error margin.

aage wrote:I keep vote tallies on an actual piece of paper. Easier to scratch out something without having to change tabs or screens. I used to do them in a reply-to-topic-tab, but that turned out to have a much larger error margin.

What is this "paper" you speak of, and where do I download it?

Haven't you heard? You need a tree.app in order to generate it.

No, no apps. This isn't some amateur software. The Paper(tm) is an extension of one's computer altogether, a genuine piece of hardware, and I'm afraid you'll even have to pay for it.